MUMBAI: In a span of three hours on November 27, 22 customers of a nationalised bank who had their accounts in the Goregaon (west) branch were duped of a total of Rs2.24 lakh by a fraudster who withdrew money from the ATM without them sharing any details.
Two days later one more person, a senior administrative officer with BEST training school, Sudash Sawant, approached the police with a similar plaint. In the case of a BEST official, he lost Rs 2.7 lakh in 29 fraudulent withdrawals between November 11 and November 22 but realised it later.
All the fraudulent withdrawals were made between 7.30pm and 10.30pm, the police said. Cops suspect that the fraudster, using a skimming device attached to the ATM machine, captured the card details, made clones of the cards and withdrew the money. A card skimmer reads the magnetic strip on the card and stores the card number.
Sawant said, “Total 29 fraudulent transactions have taken place from my account. I received a few text messages from the bank which went unnoticed as it was delayed due to a network issue. I was in a state of shock when I realised the fraudulent withdrawals. The bank officials did not show any urgency to solve the case. I don’t know whether I will get the money back.”
Similarly, another victim Mahadev Thavi (62), a carpenter, lost Rs6,600. “When I arrived at the Goregaon police station, 22 other bank customers were already present there to complain. The victims said they are worried about their money. However, a senior bank official told TOI, “We have not received any complaints from either the customers or the branches. Even the police have not approached us for CCTV footage or customers’ account details. Our bank has a three-layer security system to prevent frauds. If such fraud has happened using the cloned card, it is unclear how the fraudster got hold of the pin.”
There have been similar cases in the past. In February 2018, at least 50 people were cheated of Rs9.11 lakh in a case of card cloning. The police suspected the involvement of an inter-state gang who fitted skimming devices and cameras in an ATM of a private bank on Charni Road (West). In June 2013, cyber-thieves stole bank data of several Mumbaikars by skimming an ATM at the state police headquarters. The ATM belonged to a private bank, which has the salary accounts of police personnel. The bank credited the stolen amounts back to the accounts.
